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Tesco chewy multivitamins and minerals

WHAT ARE THEY?

These are chewy vitamin tablets for children. They are multivitamins with minerals also.

WHY DID I BUY THEM?

I buy my children vitamins if I think that they require them, I have never brought a cheap packet before because I have always thought that the more expensive ones would be best but I decided to buy these from Tesco when I watched a programme about how alot of cheap vitamin tablets are just as effective as the ones that are made by a bigger brand.

WHAT I THINK

I know that it is impossible to say how good any vitamin tablets are but I did not feel very confident about these ones. They looked very dry and cheap and my children did not like the flavour, they like orange flavour usually but these did not smell like orange and had got a very sweet smell that I thought was sickly.

They chewed the tablets and took them but complained and moaned. I did not blame them because even though I did not take one myself I did not think they would be very nice to eat.

There are many vitamins provided by these tablets and that includes vitamin A, C, D, B12 and many others. You take only one tablet each day but that does not provide 100% of any of the vitamins excepting for vitamin D, your children will only receive 38% of the vitamin C they need from these also and I think that is low for such a very important vitamin.

ANYTHING ELSE

The bottle of tablets I bought has got 90 tablets in and I have given all of them to my children because they have got a good diet and are healthy at this time of year. I am happy they have now finished taking all of these from Tesco and I am left with an empty bottle because it has said it is going to be very cold from next week and I would like to protect them if they start to look like they are going to catch colds.

I will not replace my childrens multivitamins with these again and it has made me not want to try or even look at the information about cheap brands of these tablets again.

90 tablets cost £2.70 and you can buy them from Tesco only.

2 Dooyoo Stars.

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Wont be replacing our regular vitamins with this one

I like to think that I provide my family with a well balanced healthy diet. We are all Vegetarians and am only too aware that I need to think carefully about the different food my family and I consume to be sure that we are all getting all the vitamins and minerals we need. I do include lots of Iron rich foods into my diet such as Tofu, greens, seeds, lentils etc but I do supplement our diet with vitamins and minerals. I had been buying a liquid iron and vitamin supplement for my daughters but when I recently had to make some budget cutbacks I decided to try something a little cheaper, I picked up these Tesco Kids chewy multivitamins and minerals costing £1 for 30 tablets.

Tesco Kids chewy multivitamins and minerals cone in a bright orange plastic tub with a child lock lid on top. The label on the front gives the brand and product name, along with the fact that they contain vitamins A,C,D & E.

Plenty of information is given on the back and this of course should be read thoroughly. There is an ingredients list (which i wont bother listing here), some general warnings and a circle showing the shape and size of the tablet. A table of nutritional information gives a list of all the vitamins and minerals in the supplement along with the RDA.

These multivitamins can be taken by children over three years of age. One tablet should be taken per day. They are free from wheat, yeast, fish, milk, egg, salt, gluten and are suitable for vegetarians.

The tablets themselves are a light orange colour and have a fruity Orange smell to them, they are circular in shape and of a nice size for small children. Although I bought these for my children I have tried them as well. They have a very sweet taste to them, in fact they do taste like sweets! So its no surprise that my children really like these and there is no arguments getting them to take them. Personally I think they are a overly sweet and contain a little too much sugar and sweeteners and this is one of the main reasons why I am unlikely to buy them again.

As mentioned earlier these are chewable tablets, so I think they would suit those who dislike swallowing tablets. My children and I found chewing the tablets easy, they have a bit of a bite to them, then melt in your mouth. I would compare them to the consistency of Love Hearts.

I have never noticed any unwanted side effects whilst we have been using this product. My children do not have regular blood tests so I cannot be 100% about how effective this product is. In general they do seem in good health and are rarely poorly. My eldest daughter has learning difficulties which means her concentration is pretty poor, I like to think an additional supplement helps a little with this but if I am completely honest I have never noticed a huge difference. My youngest daughter is currently going through a fussy eating phase, so I feel giving her a vitamin supplement is quite important at the moment.

Overall we have found these to be an alright vitamin tablet but due to the added sugars and sweeteners its not one I would probably buy again, so I wont be replacing my daughters regular liquid iron / vitamins with this one.

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a way to help put into your children what they need

My twin boys have a much better diet than myself, it is varied and balanced most of the time and they will eat a lot more fruit and vegetables than what I do but they do have their days where they don't get as much as advised or they should have. For this reason I decided to buy them some vitamins to try and put in them everything the body needs.

As I now mostly shop in Tesco I picked up a tub of Tesco's Children's Chewable Multivitamins and Minerals.

These particular vitamins come in a dominantly lime green plastic tub with a blue screw off lid. The front of the tub informs us there are 60 tablets within the tub and they have Vitamins A, C, D and E as well as other info. The side of the tub lists all the multivitamins and mineral these include which are the vitamins I have mentioned, Thiamin (Vitamin B1) Riboflavin (vitamin B2) Niacin, Vitamin B6, Folic Acid, Vitamin B12, Pantothenic Acid, Iron, Zinc and Iodine.

The back of the tub tells us that these are a balanced combination of vitamins and minerals for growing children in a 'forest fruits' flavour and they are reccomended for children 3 and over. One tablet a day is advised, alongside a meal.

Now I don't know if any of you noticed in my description of the tub but yes I did say it has a 'screw off' lid. It appears to be a safety top, presumably a child safety one as it has the 'tabs' on the sides of the cap for adults to squeeze in to be able to open it, whereas children wouldn't do this they would just grip the lid and turn and this type of lid is meant to be able to provent them from doing this. However, I did find that the lid screws off easily with the slightest touch to the sides so I know if left in reach many children would be able to open this tub - which of course is not safe so although I have no qualms about the vitamins if buying I would suggest keeping them well out of a child's reach.

The vitamins themselves are chunky circles in a pale creamy colour speckled in orange - nothing too exciting for a child to look at, which surprised me a little seeing as it is a children's vitamin I expected them to look a little more appealing for a childs eye. Nonetheless my boys were happy to take the vitamins when I explained they were 'good for them' and helps with them being healthy, which luckily they don't follow me and actually like to try and be healthy most of the time.

My boys like to have their 'healthy' vitamins and tell me they taste nice, before becoming pregnant I did have a try of one due to curiosity and cant really say they tasted fruity as such but were sweet and 'nice' so can understand why my boys like taking them and never fail to remind me about their vitamins.

I don't know if it has anything to do with the vitamins but I have found that since taking these regularly now for the past few months their colds have been few and far between, and their general wellbeing has been fairly good, apart from picking up a sickness bug a few weeks ago. I would like to think these vitamins help with things like this and their general feeling of wellness and would recommend these to anybody who are looking to give their children a supplement of some sort.

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A cheap way to get some extra vitamins and minerals into your kids.

I'm not the sort to take vitamins myself unless I feel there is a particular need, and I never have with my children either until fairly recently. I usually rely on them having a good selection of fruit and vegetables in their diet. However, I saw a comment about how different adult and children's nutritional needs are, so I thought I would give them a bit of a boost over the summer holidays before going back to school in September.

They both had a bad bout of chicken pox in February, and since they have both been a bit lethargic, and my 3 year old has also picked up a few colds and stomach bugs. Normally they are very healthy, but I do feel he could do with a bit of a pick me up before we hit winter again and the colds season starts and he misses time off school.

Firstly, I looked along the aisle while doing my supermarket shop, and I spotted these own branded Tesco multivitamins and minerals, and noticed that they looked quite appealing and were also a lot cheaper than similar products marketed at children. The pot is similar to the one shown in this picture, apart from the label on mine is green, and not yellow. My pot also contains 120 tablets for the price of £2.30.

Getting home the kids wanted one straight away, and I made them wait until after they had eaten, as this is what is recommended on the pot. On opening the blue lid, inside the pot was sealed with a layer of white plastic.

First slight disappointment was that the cap is kind of meant to be a safety top, with tabs on each side to squeeze in before you twist the lid, but I found quickly that you can unscrew this lid with a firm turn quite easily. I am not sure how easily a child could do this, and I am not about to advertise the ease of opening with my own children, but I am going to be sensible and store these well out of their reach.

Opening the seal inside, the tablets themselves are almost pale orange in appearance, with speckles of dark orange throughout. They were similar to chewable vitamin C tablets I have had myself before, but I was a bit unsure as to the appeal they would have with the kids. Most kids vitamins are shaped like jelly sweets for that reason.

However, I needn't have worried as both my 3 and 4 year old were quite willing to try them, and they said they were nice and my 4 year old keeps reminding me at tea time every day that it is time to take those things we bought at the shop.

I thought I would try one myself to see what sort of flavour they had. They are Forest fruit flavour, so I imagined they would taste quite fruity, which they did, but I got quite a sweet taste myself. I can see why they like taking them, because my vitamin C ones were nowhere near as sweet as this. Looking at the ingredients list, the first two ingredients are in fact sucrose and glucose, and they also have the sweetener sucralose so that explains my findings. The next major ingredient is Vitamin C, so that is why they are so orange.

The tablet was pleasant enough to just suck in my mouth till it dissolved, but I also tried chewing it and it was fairly pleasant. It wasn't chalky, and it didn't stick in my teeth at all. I was surprised again as looking at the tablet at first, it definitely tasted a lot better than it looked.

These particular vitamins can be taken by children over the age of 3 years old. The daily dose is just one tablet, which contains vitamins A, C, D and E, alongside the B vitamins thiamin, riboflavin, B6 and B12, folic acid, Iron, Zinc, Iodine, Niacin, Folic acid and pantothenic acid. All of these are 50% of the reommended daily dose required, with the exception of Vitamin D and B12 which are 100% of the daily requirement.

This is reassuring to me as I know some vitamins are not beneficial if you have too much, so this leaves some room for them to get the rest of the nutrition they need from their normal diet.

They are also free from wheat, gluten, yeast, fish, milk, eggs and sodium, so I do not have to worry that they are getting too much salt, and someone with allergies could safely take these.

Being designed for kids, they are also free of aspartame which is sometimes used as a sweetener and can make some children a bit hyper. They also don't use artificial colours, flavours or preservatives, which are those E numbers that most parents prefer not to overdo with their children.

As well as having all these great points, the use by date is about 2 years after I have purchased them, so I can be confident that we will use them up.

Overall, the reason I don't often go for vitamins and minerals myself is because I am pretty sure they are not that effective. After studying biochemistry at University I do know that the human body finds it hard to store vitamins and minerals, and get them from this sort of source compared to getting them from food.

I guess most people who are willing to buy this sort of supplement probably already give their children a varied diet, but might be like me looking for a boost after illness, or perhaps feeling they are making up for it if their child is a bit picky with what they eat.

The way I see it, it can't hurt to take them, so I am happy to buy them for a short while, and I don't see the point of buying expensive ones like sweeties and then have a battle when they can only have one, or waste money when most of it is excreted. This is one where spending more can't possible mean a better experience unless your child won't try these due to appearance